Thursday, December 31, 2015

What do you know? One of the first movies I covered in 2015 turns out to remain the best of the year. That would be Still Life (my original review of which appears here), a wonder of beauty with a subject that movies almost never get near. The result is, as a good friend of mine observed, "Haunting. It has stayed with me ever since I watched."

The remaining 51 films are listed in the order in which they opened -- or at least in which I finally viewed them. (You can click on each one to go to my original review.) I am not including any big-budget, mainstream movies this year. There were plenty of good ones, but this blog is devoted to the less-seen and under-marketed films, so let's honor that intention.
Here we go....

Still Life (see above), the great Eddie Marsan in what may be his greatest role, in the most beautiful (theme, cinematography and total execution) movie of the year. Unforgettable.

Timbuktu: A look at the Muslim world like little you'll have seen. It probably should have won Best Foreign Film last year. In any case, it's a keeper.

Girlhood: Céline Sciamma's look at French youth in the banlieues of Paris turns out to be ever better than I initially thought. And that was already damned good.

The Voices: Another film that, having viewed it twice, grows in stature. Alternately ugly and funny, it's a movie I wager you won't have seen anything quite like.

The Second Mother and I Touched All Your Stuff: Two underseen Brazilian films -- the first a narrative, the second (a still from which is shown above) a documentary -- both of which deserved a much wider audience.

Blind: An original exploration into the mind of the non-sighted, this is one hell of a trip.

Home from Home: An amazing movie from one of Germany's least-known (but ought not to be) filmmakers.

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Movie criticism (mostly foreign films, documentaries and independents: big Hollywood product hardly needs more marketing), very occasional interviews and ideas from James van Maanen, who began his late-career movie reviewing for GreenCine, then took the big blog step around a decade ago. He covers new movies, video releases, and occasional streaming choices. You can reach him at JamesvanMaanen@gmail.com